Love, Life, Death and Disaster
by DrWhoFan71
Summary: One shot was all it took, and Toshiko Sato was gone forever. Or was she? An ex-flame is forced to flee the brutal Rukkans, and when she chooses Earth to hide on, maybe something once lost can be found again... Tosh/Mary [Currently abandoned; may eventually resume]
1. Prologue

**Life, Love, Death and Disaster**

**Prologue**

**Disclaimer: **I am not the BBC and don't own any of these fantastic characters.

_(A/N – It is recommended that you watch the Torchwood Series 1 episode _Greeks Bearing Gifts_ before reading this)_

Love.

What does that word mean, anyway? Such a human thing... back home, on Arcateen IV, "love" was frowned upon. The government preferred people to find a partner quickly to increase the population rather than spend years searching for one they "loved". Mary was sure that things had changed – the government she remembered had provoked outrage by compromising the Arcateenians' usually peaceful nature. She had been sent away for going too far with her protests; she had killed a government official. Not that she had really meant to... but it didn't matter now.

Having lived for so long as a human, she had come to understand and participate in their culture. It could be said that she was as much human as she was Arcateenian after spending 200 years on this hunk of floating rock. She had come to accept it all... and now she thought she had finally actually found someone, in Tosh, who she could properly love. Not just someone to shag – she could find that easily enough at any brothel. She felt a connection with Tosh; even if it had just started as a way to get into Torchwood, it had grown.

Yes, maybe she had used and abused her relationship with Toshiko to meet her own ends; she had manipulated and deceived her, in fact. True, she **was**prepared to use Tosh as a means to her own ends... but she still felt the potential for a proper romantic connection, and that was something Mary longed for. She had no qualms that Tosh was a woman; though Arcateenians did have the same sexes as humans (male and female), they didn't play as big a part in their culture. Mary could quite easily have taken over the body of a man, and learned to be like one – it had just happened that she had stumbled across this body first (or, more like, it had stumbled across her).

She regretted that now she would have to leave Toshiko behind. But she was desperate to return home; no matter how long she stayed on Earth, she would always long for her own planet – now that there was a chance that things had changed, there was nothing strong enough to hold her here. It was a shame that her time on Earth had to end just as she was actually beginning to feel it was worth something... but such is life.

Or so she had thought.

Then that interfering Jack Harkness had discovered them... and revealed to Tosh what she had done. True, she had killed many humans... but she needed to survive! This form could only be kept fresh with the blood of other humans, and ripping out the heart was a quick way for them to go. Well, quick-ish. She wouldn't have cared to be on the receiving end herself, anyway. But still...

Now she stood with a knife to her lover's throat, having to bargain with the Torchwood team. That was exactly what she had hoped to avoid – it was always going to be a dangerous affair, but now the air was so tense that it could be cut with the knife Mary held in her hand. The knife that, with just a slip of her hand, could slice Tosh's throat wide open... Mary shivered. She didn't want to have to kill Tosh, but she would do it if she had to. She _must _get home.

She didn't want to lose the connection she had with Toshiko. Oddly enough, she had actually come to care for this particular humans' feelings; something which had never properly happened before. She understood human feelings, but tended to manipulate them more than feel sympathetic for their owners. She reminded Tosh;

"...this doesn't change the way I feel about you."

It was weird; she had killed so many in her time on this planet, and she had no guilt. Humans were an alien species to her – in her eyes she was not a brutal killer, but simply a lost soul trying to survive on a hostile alien world. Yet she actually felt properly nervous, now... could she really do it? She clenched her teeth and held the knife closer to Tosh's throat, so that just a trickle of blood slid down her lover's neck.

But... what was this? She couldn't believe her ears; it was going to be that simple. Jack was going to let her go. She could escape with no bloodshed, and they'd never be able to catch her once she was gone... eyes gleaming with triumph, she cast Tosh aside to her beloved Owen and grasped the transporter with both hands. She was going home...

The last thing Mary saw before the unbearable, searing pain and flash of blinding light was Jack's eyes, glaring back at her. She could tell that they had once had so much mercy, but now they were cold and dull.

Unforgiving.

As a switch of realisation began to throw in her head, everything disappeared, and was replaced with the high-speed sensation of being on a roller coaster, except calmer; she was bathed in blue light...

Then the pain, the burning light, and the dark. Nothing else.

Just dark.

_Hey all! I hope that you enjoyed the first chapter to this fic; I know that it's a little short but my prologues always are. I'm planning for it to be a full-length novel but there's a long way to go yet ;-)  
>I often think that Tosh needs a bit more love; she and Mary were such a good couple and I think Tosh deserves more than she got (with Mary's apparent death). So this is a sort of "what if" fic that keeps to the guidelines of canon – so it could happen!<br>This prologue takes place near the end of _Greeks Bearing Gifts_, where Jack supposedly sends Mary into the centre of the sun... if you haven't seen that episode then it won't have made much sense, sorry ;-) Please review!_


	2. Dead and Gone

**Love, Life, Death and Disaster**

**Chapter 2 – Dead and Gone**

**Disclaimer: **I am not the BBC and don't own any of these fantastic characters.

_(A/N – It is recommended that you watch the Torchwood episodes _Exit Wounds_ and _Children of Earth: Day One_ before reading this)  
><em>

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><p>Captain Jack Harkness let out a sigh of deep regret as he watched the body of his friend being placed oh-so-carefully onto the cold, hard surface that was the Torchwood morgue by Ianto.<p>

Just a few hours ago, his brother Gray had murdered one of his team; his friends. He had also caused the death of another; as a result of Gray's shooting of Tosh, Owen was unable to complete the process of fully shutting down a nuclear reactor. Owens' body had collapsed – there was nothing left of him.

Having experienced so much death and so much pain, Jack had told himself that he could deal with it; death was part of his life (quite literally, in Jack's case). But the heart-wrenching guilt and sadness as he saw Toshiko lying cold and unmoving in a body bag threatened to overwhelm him – sometimes, he just felt like breaking down in tears like a lost child.

A shaking Ianto sniffed, and began scribbling violently on a clipboard, as if it would make the pain go away. Gwen stood staring at Tosh, her expression unreadable; however, her eyes were filled with tears.

"Tosh... Toshiko Sato" stuttered Ianto. "Torchwood Three technician – deceased. Died... 7th March, 2009, aged 33. Cause of death... gu-gunshot wound to the back."

Jack put his hand on Ianto's shoulder gently.

"It's OK," he said calmingly, "Don't say it. Just... remember."

Ianto's usually composed exterior crumbled and he began to sob. Gwen was tight lipped, but before long she was also crying. Jack, his face expressionless, let them both weep into his shoulders. His jaw barely twitching – showing hardly any sign of the torment he felt inside – he zipped up the bag, closed the morgue door, and locked it. For good.

And that was the end of Toshiko Sato.

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><p><em>5 months later...<em>

Myfanwy the pteranodon emerged from a corner high up in the ceiling of the spacious room. He scrabbled along the tops of the metal coffins (for that's what they, when it boiled down to it, were), attempting to get a purchase on one of the spotless steel doors.

The Torchwood team were perfectly willing for Myfanwy to roam Torchwood Three's headquarters, though they preferred him to stay in the main hub. Though Myfanwy was also free to go outside, he didn't always do so; his sensitive sense of smell (which came as a result of a drug accidentally administered to him during his capture) caused his sinuses to be bombarded by the barrage of modern smells that roamed free in the supposedly "fresh" air; smells of toxic gases produced by factories and cars, and of fish, chips and burgers from the restaurants, fast food stores and chippies of Cardiff. Sometimes it became very hard for the pre-historic beast to resist swooping down to attack a passer-by who'd just visited McDonalds, however well he had been trained.

This was why he sometimes retreated to the morgue. Though the corpses were sealed in airtight, _and _they didn't decay, he could still smell them through the cold, thick slabs of metal that protected them. So sometimes, when no-one was around, he would sit in a corner and smell the meals he knew that he could never have.

But there was another reason why the pteranodon made occasional, stealthy (for a giant dinosaur-bird) visits to this part of Torchwood Three. Sometimes, just fleetingly, he caught a sniff of perfume... one that he recognised, and missed very much. Myfanwy had become very attached to his owners, and when Toshiko and Owen had disappeared, he'd been confused. It had happened before, of course... Suzie's "disappearance" had caused him much stress.

Sometimes, however, returning to the morgue and catching a sniff of their scent was enough to bring back memories for the surprisingly intelligent creature. Memories of times that had been good; playing a delightful game, for instance, when he would attempt to dive-bomb a ball they were throwing to eachother... good times. But they were no more.

Growing tired of hanging around a place which held the promise of both a good meal and happy memories, but failed to provide either (all he felt today was sadness that they were no longer around), Myfanwy took to the air, and swooped out of the morgue; out in to the night to hunt for something he could see, feel... taste. Maybe he could find a cave to eat and digest his meal... his owners had taught him not to bring prey back in to the hub.

The morgue lay silent for half and hour at least; for anyone observing the deafening silence would have been very unnerving. But the ear-deafening roar of a massive explosion soon fixed that... a fireball ripped through the morgue, and all the shiny fittings and nigh-undetectable aromas were replaced with fire, the smell of burning, and mound upon mound of searing hot rubble.

Torchwood Three was no more.

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><p><em>OK, so I'm still thinking about exactly where to go with this now, so I suppose it's worth asking; is it worth continuing? Reviews would be much appreciated, even to know what parts of this you didn't like, etc. Thanks to <em>_KrazeeeeeeeKatieeeeeeeee for being this story's first reviewer, and to everyone who's subscribed/added this to their favourite stories list ;) I really appreciate it. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, and please review *makes puppy dog eyes*_


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